03/25/2020
What you should know about Native Americans and Covid-19:
“We are operating in an environment of severe disadvantage,” Stacy Bohlen of the National Indian Health Board told indianz.com.
The coronavirus pandemic has served to further demonstrate the already deplorable social and health problems facing most tribes, including disproportionate rates of diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular disease, lung disease and immunosuppressive disorders – all conditions that health officials have said create greater vulnerability to COVID-19.
According to a survey conducted in early March of 197 tribal leaders, medical providers and partners, the NIHB found that 87 percent of respondents reported not having received any personal protective equipment from the federal government.
Another 82 percent of those who answered the survey said they were not using the COVID-19 test.
Native people experience overcrowded housing at a rate of eight times the national average, and nearly 32 percent of rural tribal households live more than 10 miles from the nearest grocery store—other challenges that exacerbate efforts to stop the spread of the coronavirus.
Many Native children won’t be able to continue learning while their schools are shut down, as 37% percent of Native students don’t have access to internet.
It’s important to remember that federal programs, like IHS and the Bureau of Indian Education, that serve tribal communities were paid for through the sacrifices of tribes. This is the obligation that the United States of America has to Indian Country through the treaties tribes signed when they ceded millions of acres.
In a March 7 letter to Alex Azar, Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, the National Indian Health Board called on the federal government to distribute funding to tribes for COVID-19 through IHS, who would be better equipped to get those funds more quickly and directly to IHS and other healthcare facilities operated by tribes. That plea was rejected as the Trump administration announced that the CDC would be in charge of distributing $80 million, with no experience and a grave disconnect as to the needs of tribes.
It's not just the executive branch where troubling signs have emerged. S.3548, Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act, announced last Thursday, has completely ignored and does not include Indian Country in the 247-page bill.
There are currently at least 40 COVID-19 cases in the IHS system, with Navajo Nation reporting 29 cases, plus untold numbers in urban communities and at facilities run directly by tribes.
Health care for American Indians and Alaska Natives is premised on numerous treaties and federal laws. But the IHS remains woefully underfunded -- it barely meets about half of the need in tribal and urban Indian communities, according to the U.S. government's own reports and data.
"Together these reports provide the very harsh reality that for decades, and even centuries, tribal nations have been severely and chronically underfunded in every public sector imaginable, whether it's health care, law enforcement, education or infrastructure," NCAI President Fawn Sharp said on Friday. Sharp leads the Quinault Nation in Washington state, one of the hardest hit regions in terms of COVID-19 cases and deaths.
